A HEART AS DARK AS MINE caos caliban x oc

worth it (edited)

THE DREAMS WERE TORTURE ENOUGH.

They were real, more real than her long-buried memories, more real with each dream she had,

She felt it, hands, blades, her blood and tears. It didn't matter how much she scrubbed her skin or clawed at it, the feeling never went away.

Sera tried to shrug off the feeling it left on her body, but it clung to her, like an invisible beast gripping her in its talons, never to let go.

"Please," She sobbed, curling tighter into a ball. "Please, leave me alone."

She could hear them, the rustle of their perfect, feathered wings, she could feel her flesh and muscle tear as they tore wings from her body, inch by inch.

"Stop it," She cried, "Stop it, stop it,"

Perhaps she was losing her mind, but she could hear them, feel them. She feared sleep. Her dreams would be of either Caliban, or the Angels, and she dreaded both.

She needed air. She felt like she was suffocating in dreams and memories.

Sera took a deep breath. Then another. Then another. Until finally she managed to stand on her shaking legs. She needed to calm down. She needed to breathe through it. They weren't there. They couldn't hurt her.

Sera remembered how Hilda would make her a herbal tea and hold her for as long as she needed, listen to her, or read to her, or sometimes just say nothing at all, when Sera was awoken by those dreams.

She missed them.

Hilda, Zelda, Ambrose, Sabrina. The people she'd come to know as her family.

Sera couldn't help but wonder if she'd made the wrong choice, if maybe she should have stayed with them. If she should have settled for an ordinary life in Greendale, even if she craved more.

Was power worth giving up everything that had brought her comfort, happiness?

It had to be. Because if a throne couldn't fill the growing hole in her heart, nothing could.

Sera grabbed a bottle from under her bed, and let her mind guide her to where she should be. The one place that could reassure her, that could make her forget her past.

The throne room.

The reason for her suffering, and the answer to it as well.

When she sat in that throne, Sera promised herself that it would be enough.

The pain would all be worth it in the end.

Power would heal her broken heart and soul. Power would make her okay again. It would make her whole.

She draped her legs across the side of the throne lazily, thinking, pausing. Just for a moment.

It didn't feel better, sitting there. She just felt... nothing.

But numbness was better than fear. Numbness was better than remembering.

Sera raised the bottle to her lips, and her drink burned all the way down. It was unlike anything she had ever tasted. Like pure, liquid fire. An infernal drink, she assumed. It was something she had stolen from the cellar, just in case. Just in case she needed to forget.

Tears ran down her flushed face. Warm. Unwelcome. But she did nothing to stop them. The tears made her forget, after a while, after a long while. The drink often worked faster.

"Why are you crying?"

Her eyes flicked up from the bottle.

Caliban.

"What are you doing here?"

"Don't answer a question with a question." He said teasingly. But there was something softer in his tone. If Sera didn't know better, she might have thought that he cared.

"I couldn't sleep," She said, tipping back her head as she took another long swig. This time she savoured the burn. "Nightmares. You?"

"Nightmares," He answered, slouching to sit at the bottom of the throne, his feet resting of the steps of the stone dias. Sera realised how little she knew about him, his past, compared to all he knew of her. All she had told him in those dreams.

What haunted him on dark nights like these? What he had endured- what he had endured because of her? Or something else entirely?

Sera offered him the bottle. He took it gladly.

"What if it isn't worth it?" She asked with a sigh. "The throne, I mean. What if I've been through everything for this, only for me to still be... broken."

"Is that why you hate him?" Caliban asked, "Your father. Because they hated you for being his?"

Normally, Sera may have thought his question malicious. But his tone... genuine curiosity. Not a trace of spite.

"I hate him," Sera smiled sadly, "For forcing my mother. We were punished for it, the both of us. But she hated me until her dying breath because I... reminded her of him," She sighed, "They hated me too for it. Told me that pain would 'wash away my sins', what I was. I thought that they'd make me pure, like them. But here I am..."

"Queen of Hell," He chuckled, "Not that I'm going to let you win, that is."

Sera laughed, "You couldn't stop me, Caliban." And she was reminded of a dream much like this. Where they just... talked.

It was nice, his company. It made her feel less alone.

"Want a bet?" He asked teasingly.

Sera hummed and snatched the bottle from him.

"You know, I used to pray that you were real," She said, "That I wasn't completely insane, dreaming of you."

"I hope you're not disappointed now that you know I am, princess," He laughed softly.

Sera smiled to herself, raising the bottle to her lips.

"Never."